Benedict Cumberbatch

Andy Serkis' directorial debut Jungle Book: Origins – the title of which we'll get into later – will star Sherlock's Benedict Cumberbatch as murderous tiger Shere Khan.

The Warner Bros film is not to be confused with Disney's effort, which will be directed by Jon Favreau and stars Idris Elba as Khan, Bill Murray as Baloo and Scarlett Johansson as Kaa.

Revealed by The Hollywood Reporter, Cumberbatch is the first name announced for Serkis's motion capture project, which will be released a year after Disney's mix of live action and CGI.

So far both films have made some wonderful casting decisions, making each a lot more enticing than they first appeared to be. Both films will be based on the original Rudyard Kipling novel of course, with Callie Kloves writing the screenplay for Serkis and Justin Marks for Favreau.

Anyway, about that name. Jungle Book: Origins. Does that send a shiver down the spine of anyone else?

The immediate connotation is that of X-Men spin-off X-Men Origins: Wolverine, which was famously terrible. Obviously this film and that have no links whatsoever, but the clichéd subtitle is still something of a poisonous trope of modern Hollywood.

Warner Bros clearly want something to differentiate their project from Disney's and this will offer that to an extent, but couldn't they have come up with someone else. Jungle Book Begins? Jungle Book: First Draft? Jungle Book: Rumble in the Jungle?

Jungle Book: Origins will be released on 21 October 2016.

Sherlock Disney